V-Flyer

I've booked an EX-EU from Dublin, leaving DUB at 20:40. Onward flight is from LHR the next day.

Planning to book a positioning flight that gets me into DUB for 18:10 .... do you think that's enough time or would you rather have a bit more breathing space? Hoping to work that day so wanted to leave LON as late as possible. Having said that, I assume if my LON-DUB positioning flight is delayed (and I miss the DUB flight) my entire itinerary will be cancelled? Is that right?

You're correct yes - if you don't turn up for the DUB-LON flight, the whole thing is cancelled. I would give yourself as much space as possible to avoid any unforeseen consequences.

I agree. Earlier this year I had what I thought was a generous turnaround but then the LHR-DUB flight was delayed (Aer Lingus) and then there weren't enough Guarda for the number of pax arriving on 2 flights which added to the delay. In the end I had I think 20 minutes in lounge for a quick drink & then straight off to board (I think we ended up with just over an hour between flights). I'd advise an earlier flight over.

It's a shame you can't turn around as efficiently as you can in AMS, booking the flight out to AMS that made up your return was do-able, you get off, wait at the gate and then board again. Simple. If your outbound is delayed, so will the return! But still not entirely 100% guaranteed.

Hamster wrote:It's a shame you can't turn around as efficiently as you can in AMS, booking the flight out to AMS that made up your return was do-able, you get off, wait at the gate and then board again. Simple. If your outbound is delayed, so will the return! But still not entirely 100% guaranteed.

You can still do something similar to that in DUB providing that your inbound and outbound is with the same airline. If it is with Aer Lingus, you may have to move a Gate to two. Similarly with BA. You just follow the signs for Flight Connections.

Even if the flights are with different airlines the connectivity between T1 and T2 in Dublin is good.

The safest way is to do a "back to back" on BA (assuming you don't have checked bags). That way even if the flight over to DUB is late you won't miss the return as it'll be on the same plane. You still have to clear Garda passport control and security but that shouldn't take more than 10 minutes or so.

For any other combination of flights or airlines I'd allow at least 3 hours in DUB to be safe, particularly if you have checked bags.

Great tips everyone, thanks!

Our DUB-LHR is flight BA839. I see that flight BA838 lands in DUB at 20:05. That seems seriously tight for the 20:40 departure .... but I assume they use the same plane? Can we literally get off and then re-board? We will have hand luggage only. Do we need to do passport control, leave the airport and they re-do security etc. or can we literally just wait at the gate to re-board?

Real rookie with this, so appreciate any advice!

The gate you will arrive at is a 4-5 minute walk to passport control. After you pass this you are dropped into the baggage reclaim area. Head to the stairs by belt 2 which lead back to security. This is the unknown quantity, normally a breeze but it could be a short wait here. From the exit of security it's a 2-3 minute stroll back to the gate.

It's not quite as simple as AMS where you literally just get off and stop at the top of the gangway but 35 minutes should be plenty if you have already printed your boarding passes, have hand baggage only and can walk without assistance.

Thanks Stuart.

So if everyone else was in my shoes would you choose the arriving BA flight on the basis that if that was late then the DUB to LHR would be delayed too?

Today - Boxing Day, I have just enjoyed the pleasure of Dublin, well for 2 hours anyway. Flew out this morning, on the BA834 which was 25 minutes late leaving LHR due to the late arrival of the aircraft on the gate. Made up some time on the flight and got off at very wet and miserable DUB at 12:27. Passport control was empty and we walked straight up to the booth and straight through. Check in was pretty quick and we were up in the lounge for lunch (we could have bypassed check in all together as we had no luggage, but I like to keep hard copies of boarding passes!), our return flight to LHR pushed back at 14:30 and we were off the plane at T5 and heading towards the pod parking at 15:45.

So in total we had 2 hours at DUB, my thinking behind this was to give us plenty of time for the inbound flight to be delayed and not to risk a back to back in case of problems getting back into the departure lounge at DUB . Once we got to DUB and were checked in it was then BA's responsibility to get me to my final destination which is SFO tomorrow, so in a few hours it's back to LHR and time to settle into the Clubhouse for a few hours.